Colombian President Calls for Legalization of Marijuana

By
Robin Yapp, The Telegraph
on October 26, 2011

When asked if making marijuana legal could offer a way forward, President Juan Manuel Santos said it could and that he would support it. (Photo by EPA/Felipe Ariza)Mr Santos added his voice to a growing list of influential figures in Latin America demanding a rethink of the policies that have been used for decades to fight the drugs trade.

He said legalising softer drugs such as marijuana worldwide could help improve international efforts to deal with harder drugs such as cocaine and heroin.

“The world needs to discuss new approaches … we are basically still thinking within the same framework as we have done for the last 40 years,” he said.

Asked if making marijuana legal could offer a way forward, Mr Santos said it could and that he would support it “provided everyone does it at the same time”. But he emphasised that other countries needed to take the lead, saying the issue was “a matter of national security” for Colombia, whereas “in other countries this is mainly a health and crime issue”.

“Drug trafficking is what finances the violence and the irregular groups in our country. I would be crucified if I took the first step,” he said in an interview with Metro, the global free daily newspaper chain.

His comments are the latest sign that Latin American nations scarred by violence associated with the trafficking of drugs to the US and Europe want to pressure global leaders to tackle the issue afresh.

Last month Felipe Calderón, the Mexican president, used a speech in New York to warn the US that as the world’s “largest consumer of drugs” it may have to consider legalisation “to reduce the astronomical earnings of criminal organisations”.

In June a report by politicians and former world leaders said that the global war on drugs has fuelled organised crime and recommended an end to the criminalisation of drug users and the legalisation of some banned substances.

Ernesto Zedillo, Fernando Henrique Cardoso and Cesar Gaviria, former presidents of Mexico, Brazil and Colombia respectively, were among the 19-member commission that drew up the report.

When California voted to legalize recreational marijuana use in November, few people were as thrilled...

Comments

1 Comment

David762 on
October 27, 2011 4:44 am

Is the Columbian President, Juan Manuel Santos, brave or just suicidal?

I say this because virtually all world leaders that publicly come out in favor of cannabis re-legalization wait until they are out of political office before making such pronouncements — something to do with self-survival IMVHO. It is one thing to go up against the illicit drug cartels’ financial interests, dangerous enough, but to also go against the financial interests of the USA government, their illicit drug dealers, their legal drug dealers like Pfizer, their Wall Street Mobsters / Banksters that launder hundreds of billions of dollars in cartel money, and all the USA politicians that perpetuate the Drug War for personal profit. Opposing Those vested interests has a tendency to make people die of CIA-induced aneurysms.

Sure the USA has Plan Columbia ongoing, but that’s really a matter of (1) controlling (not eliminating) the drug trade, (2) establishing a military presence to springboard into socialist Bolivia & Venezuela, and (3) control Columbia’s development of oil & natural gas resources. Plan Columbia’s ostensibly anti-narcotics mission is just a cover story, just like Obama’s DOJ ‘Fast & furious’ Operation in Mexico.

I congratulate President Juan Manuel Santos on his boldness and honesty, and wish him a long and happy life. He would do well to emulate Bolivia’s President Evo Morales, and boot the USA military, CIA, and DEA out of Columbia. A regional solution to the illicit drug trade that fuels their internal insurrection would be more successful than relying upon a deceitful USA foreign policy agenda.